


I Know You

by bellaallenxo



Category: Harry Potter - Fandom
Genre: Accident, Amnesia, M/M, Redeemed Draco
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-05
Updated: 2015-11-05
Packaged: 2018-04-30 02:49:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5147492
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellaallenxo/pseuds/bellaallenxo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Draco Malfoy has been in an accident, and has forgotten the last four years of his life-including his relationship with the one and only Harry Potter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Know You

     The sheets are too scratchy, the lights are too bright, and it is too damn cold.  I groan in frustration, wishing I was at the manor instead of school so that I could just yell for one of the house elves fix it, and then turn on my side--or at least I try to.  But in my sleepy haze I realize that 1) the bed I am lying on is much too small to be rolling about on, and 2) even if I did have the the room to roll over, someone is holding onto my arm like their life depends on it, successfully fastening me in place.

I open my eyes slowly, trying to let them adjust so that I can figure out what the bloody hell is going on.  I immediately wish I hadn’t.  My gaze falls upon one Harry freaking Potter, clinging onto me, his figure hunched over in a miserably uncomfortable position like he’s been there for a while.  He must notice that I am awake because he suddenly sits up and, with an oddly relieved expression, sighs out my name.

     “Thank Merlin, Draco,”  he says.  “Healer!  Can somebody get the healer, he’s awake!”  He doesn’t leave my side or let go of my arm but he turns his head to the door and raises his voice loud enough for someone outside to hear.

     “Oi, Potter!  Just what do you think you’re doing?  Get your hands off of me!”  I pull my arm sharply from his grasp. “And where are we anyway?”  I look around him at the room we are in.  “St. Mungo's?  What the bloody hell kind of hex did you throw at me that Pomfrey couldn’t fix?”  As I take my eyes from our surroundings and look back at him, I begin to understand that something must be going on.  His expression is stricken with... worry? I guess so, which strikes me as odd because the boy-who-just-wouldn’t-die doesn’t get worried for just any reason.  But it isn’t just the worry.  Fright is written across his face, which is screwed up horribly like I’ve never seen before, like he is confused and suspicious all at once, making him look like he’s about to puke or something.  I feel an odd a ping in my heart at that, which leads me to wonder why I care about what Potter feels anyway.  I shake it off.

     “Why’re you making that awful face? Come on then, spit it out.  What’s going on here?”  I prod him, but refrain from reaching out to poke his chest as it looks as if he might fall off his chair at any second.  I wait for a few seconds before sighing dramatically.  “Alright, now. You can drop the facade.  Why am I in St. Mungo's, why are you here acting like you give a flip about my well being, and why won’t you tell me what is going on?”

He doesn’t answer, but instead just sits there waging a staring war with me that I have no interest in either winning or losing until a couple of witches walk in who I assume to be the healers that Potter was yelling for.

     “Mr. Malfoy, good to see you awake,”  the brunette one started.  “You had quite the fall.  Now, what do you remember from the accident?  Anything?”

I try to think back as the blonde haired one begins what I assume to be a check on my vitals by flashing lights in my eyes and checking my pulse with her hand.

“Erm, nothing at all actually.  Last thing I remember I was having breakfast.  What happened, since the boy-who-just-wouldn’t-answer over there won’t say a word?”  I nod my head towards him, who has his face buried in hands.  She eyes him oddly before continuing.

     “Nothing to trouble you with now, not before we’ve gotten you fed and checked out.  Don’t worry though.  We’ll tell you all about it before long, we just don’t want to overwhelm you when you’ve just woken up.”  She speaks so reassuringly that I trust her, for now, and let it drop.  “So what else can you tell me about your breakfast?  Who you were with, what you were eating that morning, anything like that?”  She leans against the bottom corner of my hospital bed and smiles at me warmly.

     “Well I was having porridge I believe, and reading the Daily Prophet.  I think Blaise and Pansy were sitting next to me but we weren’t talking really.”  I shrug, wondering why she wants to know so much about my breakfast, and when I see her frown deeply and sigh out an “Oh dear,”  I furrow my eyebrows.

     She purses her lips and chances a glance at Potter, seeming to understand his stature now although I was still clueless.  She continues to question me.  “And where were you having breakfast exactly Draco?”  I notice her switch from ‘Mr. Malfoy’ to ‘Draco’ and wonder what caused the lack of formalities.  I frown.

     “The great hall.  Where else would I be?”  I say slowly and uncertainly, not exactly sure where this conversation is going.

     She doesn’t answer, and there is a silence as she searches for her next words.

     “I was afraid of this.”  She shooed the other witch out of the room, who had been hovering beside the bed ever since she finished fiddling with me, and set the clipboard down beside her on my bed.  “Look Draco, I believe you’re experiencing some temporary memory loss due to the head trauma you received when you fell off of your broom,” she said regrettably, as though telling me that someone I loved was dead.  “This actually is very common.  Most people regain their memory fairly soon once they have been put into context.  You graduated from Hogwarts four years ago.  The war is over.  You and your mother gave valuable information that was key in helping the Order to work against Voldemort after you switched alliances.  Do you remember any of this?”  She looks at me expectantly, as if her words should trigger a flood of memories.

     I look at her incredulously for a while.  Does she really expect me to believe any of this?  It doesn’t sound wrong necessarily, I just don’t feel like I’m missing anything.  The story sounds reasonable.  Mother and I have a change of alliances planned but it won’t be conceivable for months at the least.  Surely I would at least feel the absence of my lost memories.  I wouldn’t just wake up and remember up to a certain point in my life.  I would be confused.  But I am quite sure I know exactly what today is supposed to entail.  I have a transfiguration essay due today and I can remember almost every word of it.  Surely if it was years later I wouldn’t remember that.

     It seemed like forever before I spoke again.  “Alright now you can both drop this load of bollocks.  I don’t know what kind of sick joke this is but you can all stop it this instant.  What actually happened?”  I say scathingly.  I have a reputation to uphold after all.  I look expectantly between her and Potter until she decides to speak.

“Draco, I’m telling the truth.  I know this is hard to digest but you have to trust me on this.”  Her eyes are wide and she looks genuine.  I feel myself starting to give in, if only for the fact that I see no reason for her to lie about something as ridiculous as this.  But it still seems too absurd to be true.  And it doesn’t really explain why I woke up with Potter clinging to me either.

     “Well... Say I did believe you.  Where does Potter fit into this whole thing?  Last I remember he’s still throwing curses at me in the bathroom.  Now he’s waiting for me to wake up by my hospital bed? Explain that.”  He looks up at me when I started talking, catching my attention, and he flinches when I talk about our last fight.  When I look back at the lady she picks up her clipboard stands to leave.

     “Well I think I’ll let Mr. Potter fill you in on that one.  Someone should be around in about...” she looked at the clock on the wall, “forty-five minutes with some lunch for you. Good luck.”  The last part is directed at Potter.  She walks out, closing the door behind her.

     The silence she leaves in her wake is smothering.  I try to comprehend all that I have just been told and I guess he is trying to figure out how to word what he is going to say next but all I know is neither of us are speaking and I am wondering if lunch will come with a steak knife so I can cut the tension.  Eventually, it is Potter who ends the awkward stalemate.

     “We’re engaged.”  Potter blurts out, and then gets up to pace around the room.

     “What?”  I watch him as he shoved his hands into his hair and ruffles it.  No wonder it looks like hell every day.

     “We’re engaged.  You know, to be, like, married. And stuff.”  The next part of his monologue is hurried words whispered like he is afraid they are too delicate to be spoken.  “You joined our side sometime at the end of sixth year and we worked together.  You trained me in defense against the dark arts until there wasn’t I spell I couldn’t cast or deflect, and I taught you that you don’t always have to be mad at the world.  You went with Ron, Hermione, and me to find Voldemort’s Horcruxes instead of going back to Hogwarts seventh year.  You and Hermione would stay up until dawn talking about philosophy and literature and God knows what else just to keep from going crazy.  You taught Ron how to sketch so he’d stop fidgeting with his hands.  You made me forget to mope about even when I wore the damned locket.  You kept us all going when we thought there wasn’t any hope left.  You even got Ron to stop calling you ferret, once he came back.  Your parents knew so much about Voldemort that it wasn’t hard to stay right on his trail.  We stayed in touch with them when we could, but it wasn’t often.  It had been months since we’d had any communication with them when they died, but they died a heroic death together, just like they would have wanted.  It was at the final battle when some of their old Death Eater buddies found them fighting alongside Kingsley.  Their funeral was four days later, and you cried harder because you couldn’t remember your last words to them and you just wanted closure.  That was the first time you told me you loved me.  I said it back right away.  We didn’t mention it again until five months later when you stopped being mad at the world again.  Sometimes at night when you think I’m asleep you tell me love me more than I love you and that you’re glad I saved you.  But...”  The tears have stained his face and are choking him, so the next words come out garbled..  “it’s not true because you’re the one who saved me, and you couldn’t even see it and now you might never see it.”

     The memories don’t come flooding back.  The story that comes out his mouth sounds just like that--a story.  I  can’t imagine it being mine and it doesn’t even sound familiar.  My parents can’t be dead.  They sent me an owl just yesterday, and I am supposed to write them back tonight.  They aren’t dead.  They can’t be dead.  But I get a sense of deja vu when I look at him leaning against the wall for support as he puts his hands on the back of his neck and pushes his elbows towards each other with a strong exhale.  His eyes close as sinks to the ground and sits there, trying to calm his shaking breaths.  Something in me breaks, and I can’t believe I’m about to do this, because for Merlin’s sake I thought I’d be the last person to comfort Harry Potter but here I go, getting up and sitting in the floor in front of him.  I reach out and grab his wrists to bring his hands away from his face and he stares at me, red rimmed green eyes accenting the fresh tears.  When I’m certain he will keep his hands down I bring mine up to cup each side of his face and I use my thumbs to wipe away the tears.

     “I don’t remember a single part of anything you just said ever happening.  But I don’t think you’re lying.  I remember this, I think.  I remember you.”  His eyes begin to water with even more tears and I wait for them to fall so I can wipe them away too.  It seems so familiar, to comfort this man in his vulnerable state.  Which is strange, considering I’ve spent the last six years of my life (that I can remember anyways) kicking him when he was down.  “Hey, don’t cry.  Please don’t cry.  I can’t stand it when you cry, Harry.”  And I know that, even though the words taste strange on my tongue.  I don’t know how I do but for the moment, it’s enough.

     He brings his hands up to cup my face, mimicking me, and we sit there taking each other in. I memorize his face until I feel the need to break the silence.

     “You’re like a dream I just woke up from but can’t remember.”  I say, searching his face for the answers.  He pulls my face closer to his, and it is awkward because of our position on the floor but even when he hesitates, giving me the chance to back away, I just pull him to me, and we are kissing, and it is the best first kiss I’ve ever had because he knows just what he is doing and we are already in tune.  I have only kissed two boys in my life, and one was a dare and the other was an experience that was neither dreadful nor fantastic.  Our kiss doesn’t last long, and when he pulls away I whisper, “I know you,” over and over again because I do and he tastes like strawberries and it doesn’t surprise me at all even though I haven’t ever considered it before.   He pulls me so that my back is against him and he is holding me and I can swear I’ve felt that sensation a thousand times before, that our bodies have melded into one another like time melds the shadow into the moon.  I keep repeating my mantra into his neck as I drag my nose back and forth across the skin there, taking in the smell of strawberries that is not-so-unfamiliar.  I don’t know how long we lay there but I must fall asleep at some point because when I wake up I am in the hospital bed and he is sleeping in the chair beside me.

     I try to think back, and grasp the memories that are so close to me that they are on the tip of my tongue.  I know them, like I know Harry, but I can’t make the connections between my observations and the conclusions they lead me to.

     I look past Harry, to a small table in the corner that has a tray of unappetizing food that must have been brought in at some point in my slumber and a large bouquet of flowers resting on its surface.  They remind me of something, but I can't tell what and I stare at them, scrutinizing them as if they would trigger all of my memories.  Eventually, they do.

 

* * *

 

     I remember the way the tears tasted when they streamed into my mouth and the way their salinity burned my nose when they found their way there.   I remember the looks on everyone's faces as they came up one at a time to give their condolences.  And I remember standing by a huge table filled with obnoxiously bright flowers after everyone else left.  But most of all I remember Harry’s arms around my waist, the only thing keeping me from crumpling to the ground.  I remember shaking Harry with my sobs and then pulling back to press a chaste kiss on his shocked lips before sobbing “I love you” into his shoulder. I remember those same lips replying “I love you, too,” just moments later.

 

     And then more memories come, of us flying, cooking, going out to dinner, holding hands in public and snickering at what the daily prophet would say about it all the next day.  I remember him getting down on one knee on our second anniversary and asking me if he could have all the anniversaries after that too.  And there are more, I can tell, that don’t come to the surface right away.

 

     “Harry.”  I whisper into the night.  His eyes shoot open.  “Thanks for saving me.”  He smiles at me sleepily, dazzling me like always, and squeezes my hand.  I squeeze back.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it! It's my first Drarry fic, and the first fic I've posted on this site! Leave me a comment below!


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